


Work Song

by ihaveaplan



Category: The Cruel Prince, The Folk of the Air - Holly Black, The Wicked King - Fandom, hurt - Fandom - Fandom, twk spoilers - Fandom, wayyy post-twk
Genre: F/M, they've got issues but they love eachother
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-27
Updated: 2019-02-27
Packaged: 2019-11-06 17:04:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 520
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17943683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ihaveaplan/pseuds/ihaveaplan
Summary: A collection of post- The Wicked King drabbles about Jude and Cardan being separated and eventually finding their way back to each other. Inspired by Work Song by Hozier.(when my time comes around, )(lay me gently in the cold dark earth,)(no grave could hold my body down,)(i'll crawl home to her.)





	Work Song

**Author's Note:**

> this first chapter is SAD so be prepared.

I had held my own well enough, maneuvering my way to Vivi’s apartment. I had trekked the mortal streets shedding minimal tears for the heartbreak I had endured, but now, alone in the guest room, I broke. Collapsing on the floor of the locked bedroom, I sobbed. My body shook and ached, my chest and throat seared as though the shards of my broken heart had taken root in my muscles and tissue. It was a wound that I couldn’t stitch closed. 

I had gambled all, and what a fool I had been. My mind wandered back to Val Moren juggling- “I only wish that you will juggle better than I had…” Well, I had juggled my pride, my honor, my friends, my father, my sister, and whatever the hell Cardan was supposed to be to me, and I had tripped and it all came crashing down- glass globes crashing on the ground, shattering at my feet.

God, Cardan. I hated him, I hate him now, but in the interim, I had loved him. In the weeks that I spent suffocating and starving under the sea, I thought of him. I had fought back my tears at the thought of never seeing him again, I had savored the feeling of resting my head on his bare chest, his cold fingers mindlessly tangled in my hair. His heartbeat. The complexity and duality of his nature that I had begrudgingly fallen in love with had been my downfall. And now, I thought of him still. I thought of his vow to me, I thought of the flowers blooming overhead in his chamber, I thought of blushing in the dim candlelight of the royal suite- I thought of sleeping, tangled up in his sheets. I thought of how I had fooled myself into thinking that was the end of the story. Of course, it wasn’t. Of course, he’d have the last word.

Damn it. Damn it. I hate that he meant something to me- I hate that he still does. More than that, I hate that I am losing everyone, and I hate that I fear I’m even losing myself. Jude- once I knew who I was, but I’m always changing. I’m just as much air as the fair folk.

Jude. “It’s Latin,” I remember my mother telling me once. “It means ‘The Praised’.” And so I had been Jude, the praised one. Madoc’s favorite, despite being his bastard. Jude, the warrior, the chivalrous, dutiful daughter, and loving sister. What I would learn on one such occasion in the mortal realm was that it was an affectation of “Judas,” the betrayer. I became the betrayer, crossing my family and fooling Cardan- taking over the Court of Shadows, how clever I thought that I had been. And now, I was Saint Jude, the patron of lost causes. Patron of myself, my failings, my shortcomings. Queen of nothing. I had nothing to my name but the four letters it contained. 

How far I had fallen. I had been Jude, commander of men, now reduced to crying openly on the floor of a barren guest room.

**Author's Note:**

> I'll alternate Jude/Cardan every chapter- next is "So Full of Love, I Could Barely Eat" (it's also sad OOF)


End file.
